


If These Wings Could Fly

by regnbaggen



Series: I'm Not a Stranger to The Dark [6]
Category: Batman - All Media Types, DCU
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Bruce Wayne is a Good Parent, Dick Grayson Needs a Hug, Dick Grayson is a Ray of Sunshine, Dick Grayson is a Talon, Fluff, Gen, Kid Dick Grayson, Loss of Parent(s), Romani Dick Grayson, The Flying Graysons - Freeform, Trapeze
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-20
Updated: 2021-02-20
Packaged: 2021-03-16 23:29:19
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,432
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29583780
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/regnbaggen/pseuds/regnbaggen
Summary: He knows a lot about Bruce, thanks to the terrible press that kept bringing up Bruce's backstory as reason for him taking in more kids. Bruce had lost his parents, just like Dick had. His parents had been shot in front of him and Alfred had taken him under his wing."It's their anniversary." Dick finally says, not taking his eyes off of the moon.Bruce and Dick didn't come off to a great start. Despite that, both of them had more in common than both were comfortable with; losing their parents, being ripped from their ordinary lives and thrust into grief and hurt. Maybe it's time that they realise how similar they are, not to mention spill some long lost secrets.
Relationships: Dick Grayson & Bruce Wayne
Series: I'm Not a Stranger to The Dark [6]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2105457
Comments: 4
Kudos: 78





	If These Wings Could Fly

**Author's Note:**

> Note that Ace-The-Bathound's story has been changed because I felt that it would be more fitting to the story, sorry not sorry (or maybe a little-tiny-bit sorry).

Dick wakes up feeling numb. It's not like his 'Talon numbness', but more of a different type of numb.

He sneaks out of the bed without managing to wake Jason up and leaves the bedroom with mini-Zitka clutched in his arms. He's explored most of the manor and has already found a route leading up to the roof. He'd discovered this route by mistake but he liked having something that was his own, a place he could go to without someone barging in. He sits down by the edge of the roof, dangling his legs into the air.

The moon's still up and Dick looks out over the sea of lights. The city of Gotham really was pretty, although Dick thinks back on all of the places the Circus had gone. Gotham wasn't even remotely close to some of the most beautiful places, but Dick still found himself liking this city.

It almost felt like home.

"Dick?" Bruce's voice causes Dick to turn.

Bruce was standing by the chimney, giving him a tightly masked concerned look.

"Do you mind if I join you?" Bruce asks and Dick's eyes widen slightly.

He hadn't expected Bruce to ask but he finds himself nodding and Bruce walks forward and sits down a couple of feet away from Dick.

Dick turns his eyes back out towards the night and they sit in a comfortable silence. It was uncommon for them to be anything except awkward but Dick doesn't have the energy to try and analyse why they weren't this time.

"How was it meeting Zitka again?" Bruce asks, breaking the silence.

"It was nice. I miss her." Dick mumbles, hands clutching mini-Zitka tighter.

"I understand, I miss Ace too." Bruce offers and Dick nods slowly.

He knows a lot about Bruce, thanks to the terrible press that kept bringing up Bruce's backstory as reason for him taking in more kids. Bruce had lost his parents, just like Dick had. His parents had been shot in front of him and Alfred had taken him under his wing.

"It's their anniversary." Dick finally says, not taking his eyes off of the moon.

"I understand, how are you feeling?" Bruce asks and Dick closes his eyes.

"I don't- I want to feel sad. At Linden I felt sad but now... I don't feel anything. I- I barely-" Dick stops himself, he can't say it.

Can't say the words out-loud, how he's started to forget them. Forgetting their faces, forgetting their voices, their smell - everything.

"I lost my parents too." Bruce's voice was low but gentler than Dick's ever heard him speak before.

"I know."

Dick isn't sure why he says that, why he doesn't just stay quiet.

"Their names were Martha and Thomas Wayne." Bruce states and Dick nods slowly. "It still feels strange, using past-tense to describe them. It's been almost thirty years but sometimes it feels like just yesterday while other days it feels like a lifetime ago."

"Do you... do you miss them?" Dick asks and Bruce sags.

"Sometimes, more often than not. I wished that they'd gotten to meet all of you." Bruce explains and Dick nods again.

"I don't know if I'd want mine to meet me." Dick whispers, looking down at his hands.

He'd become a monster. Someone who'd killed people, someone that wasn't the same kid that his parents had raised. Dick's sure that his parents wouldn't be proud of who he was, of how he'd survived.

"I feel the same way sometimes, I'm scared of what they will think of me today: of who I am today but I also think, or rather hope, that they wouldn't judge my way of surviving. That's what anyone who's been through a loss like that can do; find a way to survive and then hopefully get to live." Bruce explains, gaze still on the city in front of them.

"I don't want them to see me like this. Like- like a monster." Dick whispers, pulling his legs up to his chin and hugging them close.

"You are not a monster Dick. Being a talon doesn't make you a monster and being forced to kill people doesn't make you the actual killer. You didn't have a choice, but now you do. Now you get to decide who you want to be, what your legacy will be." Bruce states, body turning towards Dick and Bruce's eyes finally land on him.

"I don't- I thought Talon wasn't a part of me, that he would disappear but he's still... here." Dick whispers, closing his eyes as the feeling of Talon inside his mind makes him shiver.

"There will always be darkness inside of us Dick, but I must admit that after what you did, after you managed to save Jason I didn't necessarily see Talon as something dark, as something bad. I saw Talon as the part of you that refused to let another person be taken from you - the part that would do anything to protect their family." Bruce's words causes Dick to look up, to watch him through his wet eyelashes.

"I don't know what to do." Dick's breath hitches and more tears leave his eyes.

"Perhaps not now, but you will. It takes time, but you're already on your way by learning more about yourself." Bruce answers easily before getting up. "Come, there is something I have been wanting to show you for some time now."

Bruce helps Dick down from the roof and back into the manor. They walk through the dark hallways and Dick stays close to Bruce but stops his hand from grasping Bruce's plum coloured sweater and instead curls tighter around mini-Zitka.

They walk all the way to a the living room and Bruce tells Dick to stay there. Dick sits down on the couch and feels himself growing tense. What was Bruce going to show him? Was Bruce kicking him out? Was he going to force Dick to take another blood test of testing some drugs?

Bruce walks back into the room, carrying a large brown box. He puts it down on the floor in front of Dick before crouching down next to it.

"I should have told you this in the beginning, I tried to during our breakfast but we got interrupted. To answer your question back then; yes I've been to a circus before. I actually saw you and your parents during that night." Bruce's voice was calm, collected while Dick feels like someone's punched him.

Bruce- Bruce had been there? During the night of his parents' fall? That wasn't possible, Dick- that couldn't have been possible.

"I wanted to talk to you, but Gordon had already taken you away. I- I always regretted not trying to get in contact with you, but I was young, I didn't think that I could give you anything and as the years went on I just assumed that you had been adopted. I never even knew that your name was Dick, I was told it was Richard." Bruce's words made no sense.

Dick felt himself growing dizzy. Bruce had not only seen him, but had wanted to- to meet Dick? To maybe ask Dick to live with him, like he had asked Jason?

"I did, however, manage to get some things from the circus. I was told by Gordon that you didn't have time to gather your things so I just kept them in case I would be able to find you again." Bruce continues and Dick feels close to throwing up while his eyes stay on the box in front of him.

It was too much, everything was just too much.

"I- I don't know if I want to see it." He croaks out and Bruce nods.

"I don't expect you to. It took me some time before I managed to look through my parents' things, but I wanted you to know that you have a choice, that you can look in here when you're ready." Bruce states, patting the box beside him.

Dick nods again, eyes managing to flick back up to Bruce's face. He carries an understanding look on his face, something Dick had rarely seen. They didn't understand a lot about each other, they were too different to have something in common.

This however, this was something they did share.

"Do you think that they'd be disappointed in me?" Dick asks, voice breaking.

Bruce gets up from his crouched position and sits down next to Dick on the couch. His movements are slow, giving Dick a chance to pull away if he wants to, but Dick doesn't. He lets Bruce lay an arm around him, lets him hold Dick.

Dick breaks.

New fresh tears roll down his cheeks and he sobs, turning to hide his face into Bruce's side while his hand grabs the soft supple material of Bruce's sweater.

"I think they'd be proud of you for managing to survive, and I think they're happy that you've finally found a home." Bruce states and that only makes Dick cry harder.

He moves until he's in Bruce's lap, crying against his chest while Bruce holds him. Bruce doesn't say anything else but Dick knows that he understands. Knows that Bruce knows exactly how he's feeling.

.

It takes Dick a month until he's ready.

He gets out of bed without waking up Jason, leaving mini-Zitka with him and sneaks into Bruce's bedroom. Bruce's light snores fill the room as Dick moves over to his bedside.

"Bruce?" His voice is but a whisper and he has to try four more times until Bruce actually wakes up.

"Huh? Dick?" Bruce rasps, sounding both confused and alert at the same time.

"I think I'm ready, but I don't want to do it alone so... will you do it with me?" Dick asks and Bruce grows quiet for a moment, probably trying to figure out what Dick means before clarity enters his eyes.

"Of course."

Bruce gets out of the bed and pulls on his slippers before he follows Dick to the living room. The box's sitting in the corner of the room, next to a big plant that Jason had accidentally knocked aside two times during their intense wrestling matches.

Bruce helps Dick pulls the box out on the soft carpet and Dick sits down on the floor.

His hands are shaking as they move towards the box and he suddenly stops himself as they move to the lid. "What if I don't remember any of it?" He asks, looking over at Bruce with rare vulnerability.

Bruce sits down on the carpet in front of him, sending him a comforting smile. "Then you let that be okay."

Dick takes a deep breath before his hands manage to open the lid, putting it down on the carpet. He looks inside and his throat almost instantly closes up.

At the top of the box there was a picture, it was small and worn, the only colors existing were black and white but he can recognize the people in it. It's him, and his parents. They're standing together with him in the middle and they're wearing their costumes. All three of them are smiling and Dick watches his mother- and father's faces. They're light and bright, both wearing kind gentle eyes and Dick sniffles.

He grabs the picture and examines it closer. He's smiling too, a real toothy smile, chest puffed out in pride of his costume. Dick vaguely remembers that day, it had been the first time he'd gotten to perform with them and he'd loved it.

He takes a deep breath before raising it for Bruce to see. Bruce sends him an unsure look but Dick sends him an encouraging nod. Bruce takes it with gentle hands and examines it. He smiles and states that Dick inherited his eyes from both of his parents before gently handing it back to Dick.

Dick lowers it and continues to look through the box. There's a dark blue scarf that must have belonged to his mother and a book that has his father's name in it. Dick examines both items with care and is barely aware of himself describing them to Bruce, explaining how his father had been interested in stars on their travels with the circus and how he'd bought this book and taught Dick about them too. Dick had forgotten most of it, only remembering bits and pieces but what he feels is most important is the image of his father's enthusiastic face as he tells Dick all about the mysteries up in the sky.

There's a poster in the box too, the one with him and his parents swinging on the trapeze along with the title 'The Flying Graysons'. It's in near-mint condition and even signed by all three. This was the first poster that Dick had been on and Dick remembers being so excited. Remembers the rush and pride of finally being a part of his parents' legacy.

"I- I remember, but I don't know if I want to." Dick states, voice growing weak and Bruce moves around the box so that he's sitting next to Dick.

Dick pulls out one of his old costumes, it's bright with colours of red, green and yellow. Dick holds it close, watching the G his mom sowed onto it. Dick shows Bruce, unaware of tears slowly making their way down his face.

"She used to call me Robin... I-I remember that now. She thought I looked like a Robin when I was on the trapeze." Dick sniffles and Bruce puts a hand on Dick's shoulder and states once again that Dick isn't alone and that he can stop if he doesn't want to see more.

Dick does, that's his problem. This box- it could never be enough. Dick remembers too much, remembers his mother's laugh, the way his father's eyes would crinkle with joy, the feeling of _flying_.

"I miss them, I miss flying." Dick cries and Bruce pulls him in close, hugging him.

"You might not be able to see them again, not in real life, but you _can_ fly again. I saw you up there and it would be downright wrong of anyone to try and take that away from the world." Bruce murmurs and Dick continues to cry against him.

"I don't know how."

"I'll take care of it _chum_ , you don't have to worry about that." Bruce states and he tenses as the nickname slips but Dick only buries himself harder into Bruce's side.

.

Dick wasn't sure exactly what Bruce had meant that night, but he only had to wait for a week until Bruce told him to follow him into a big room behind a big door with a window in it right next to the already existing gym.

"I understand that it isn't quite like the one you had in the circus but I don't feel particularly comfortable with the idea of not having a net." Bruce states and Dick can only stare.

Inside was a huge training room that had both trapezes and platforms along with gymnastic equipment like rings, uneven bars, a balance beam and a large mat that looked like it had some springs.

"I can ask them to take it down if you don't like it or-"

"Nono I- it's-" Dick's at loss for words.

He stares at everything. The bright room, the large _high_ ceiling-

"Did you have to remove the rooms on the second floor to make this?" Dick asks, looking up towards the ceiling.

"It wasn't an issue, they were only used as storage." Bruce explains and Duck nods again.

"Oh."

"Do you want me to leave? To get Jason or Alfred? I think that they're-"

"No. No it's fine, just- could I just be alone, just for a short time but-" Dick almost stumbles over his words and Bruce nods, leaving and closing the door behind himself.

Dick starts to walks forward until he gets to the bottom of the platform. He takes a deep breath, does he really want to do this?

Is he ready for this?

Dick grabs a hold of the first handle. It's cold and before he's even realizing what he's doing he's grabbed onto the second handle. He starts climbing up the platform until suddenly he's on the top.

The trapeze is ahead, the distance between them almost feels like it's mocking Dick. It's not far, the old Dick would be able to catch it with ease, but Dick isn't the same. He hasn't done this in years and the last time he did it he'd watched his parents fall.

A shiver runs through his body and Dick blinks himself aware. He can't get lost in memories, not now, not when he's finally able to get a part of himself back. To be able to fly again had been a dream and now it was only two feet away.

It wasn't the part that missed his parents that made him take a step forward, nor was it the thoughts of flying. The thing that made him take a step forward was the moment he realised that all of this was his choice. Bruce had given him a _choice_ , Dick could walk away from here and Bruce would be okay with it. Dick could ask him to take everything down and Bruce would. 

His hand grasps the trapeze and the sound of a roaring audience causes him to close his eyes. Imagine himself back at the circus, in his 'The Flying Graysons' costume. Zitka standing below him and looking up, just like the rest of the audience. The spotlight hits him and Dick opens his eyes and _leaps_.

_He's flying._

He's really flying, _soaring_ over the audience, he listens to their cheers. He doesn't think when he jumps into the air, letting go of the trapeze only to catch the one waiting for him. It comes natural; this was who he was, and who he could be.

Dick lets himself get lost in the sensation, in the moment where everything felt as if it would be okay. Where everything felt _perfect_. Nothing could bring him down, no one would ever be able to take this away from him.

Time stops meaning anything and he only stops when the straining in his muscles become apparent. It takes him a moment to come back to himself and he looks out over the empty room, there was no audience here, no spotlight, nothing except himself. 

Dick muses over that thought as he climbs down. Maybe he'd be okay, in moments like these he's slowly realising that he doesn't necessarily try to find himself but rather let himself break loose when the time is right.

Bruce's waiting outside the door along with Jason and Alfred.

"Hi." Dick sends them a nervous smile but something about him causes all three of the men to look both surprised and happy, genuinely happy.

"Hey Dickie." Jason smiles and Dick bites his lip, looking at all of them.

"Thank you, for helping me." Dick says, looking up at Bruce who in turn looks even more surprised.

Dick moves forward, slowly as to make sure that Bruce is okay with it, and hugs Bruce. Bruce tenses and Dick is about to let go when Bruce's arms suddenly come around him.

"Of course chum." Bruce manages and does a good job of hiding the strain in his voice and Dick closes his eyes.

He stays like that for a couple of seconds, maybe even a minute before Dick finally lets go and takes a step back.

"I'm going to take a shower." Dick states, hurrying around the corner to his room.

He stops when he hears Jason let out a harsh laugh.

"Very good Master Bruce, how long were you waiting for him, may I ask?" Alfred's voice asks and Dick can hear Bruce shrug.

"Three or four hours. He seemed... happy." 

"Yeah, I think that was the first non-shit thing you've ever done." Jason snorts and Dick swallows.

What if Jason was mad? Maybe he didn't like that Dick got this? 

No, Jason would be happy for him. Jason was always happy for him.

"I hope that I can continue doing that for more people than just Dick then." Bruce states and Dick hears Jason let out a huff before steps are heard.

Dick scurries away and towards their room. He manages to throw himself into their shared bathroom, closing the door and starting the shower.

The smile on Dick's face stays on for the remainder of the day and the next week to come.

**Author's Note:**

> I've been wanting to write this for awhile. I've been dealing with loss recently and I've come to realise how different it is for everyone and how the stages of grief vary. I think Bruce doesn't get enough credit about the fact that he's been severely traumatised and still manage to function somewhat properly (you know, except for dressing up as a bat and kicking ppl's asses).  
> I don't know, just think this is one of the main things where Bruce and Dick can really connect (sadly).
> 
> Stay safe and use bread-crumbs as bait.  
> Kudos and Comments always make my day (:


End file.
